In the, almost, two months since its release, Creed, starring Sylvester Stallone and Michael B. Jordan, has ridden a wave of critical and audience praise, which has garnered the film a whopping 21 award wins from movie organizations across the country, including a win for Stallone’s supporting performance at the Golden Globes. The movie is already planning a sequel, and it looks like it may have some stiff competition when it debuts.
According to Variety, Creed 2 is eyeing a November 2017 release date, this would put the film in direct competition with two other November 2017 releases: Thor 3 and the first Justice League movie.
This opening would mean that the Creed sequel would show up in theaters pretty much exactly two years after the first movie. Creed, of course, followed former world heavyweight champ Rocky Balboa (Sylvester Stallone) as he acted as trainer and mentor to Adonis Johnson Creed, son of his past rival and late friend Apollo Creed. Stallone told Variety that the currently proposed storyline for the sequel would flash backward and forward in time, sort of like The Godfather: Part II.
Creed has done pretty well for itself financially and critically. The current worldwide gross is a little over $118 million, while the film only cost an estimated $35 million to produce, and it finished third at the box office on its opening weekend. Rotten Tomatoes has it at a score of 93 percent with critics, while audiences have given it an average of an A rating on CinemaScore.
Right now Thor 3 (officially titled Thor: Ragnarok) is due on November 3, 2017. Since it looks like our hero will be racing to stop the Asgard apocalypse (with Loki in tow, no less), this promises to be another Marvel-based movie-going event. There’s also a possibility that the film will cast big-name award-winner Cate Blanchett in a role, and that the film will be the first Marvel movie to have a female villain as the main antagonist. And, both things are likely to add to people’s desire to come out for the film.
Justice League Part One is due in theaters on November 17, 2017. The big draw for this film is, of course, the gob of DC heroes that will appear, as well as the appearance of a foe big enough to need several of DC’s heaviest hitters to stop him. There’s almost no doubt that Thor 3 and Justice League will be blockbusters, so, where does that leave Creed?
Many people would think the the filmmakers are crazy for willingly going up against two massive superhero movies, but it might just be an idea so crazy it’s crazy good. No matter how popular superheroes get, there will always be people who couldn’t care less about them. And, there will surely also be people who are tired of the trend, or those that give up on the separate franchises because of their reaction to the movies that came before. Those people will probably want to hit a theater for something in November of 2017, so, why not Creed 2? Plus, the original film has plenty of fans, and they will be likely to want to keep up with the series.
Whatever happens when these movies are released, let’s all hope that Creed 2 can still manage to stake a claim on a good chunk of the marketplace. Any franchise that can bring Sylvester Stallone back to award-winning actor status deserves a shot at the box office.
